Suchergebnisse

Purpose
– The purpose of this paper is to determine recidivism outcomes for 953 offending men with domestic violence histories, serving community-based sentences and enroled in the domestic abuse program (DAP), provided by Corrective Services New South Wales in Australia.


Design/methodology/approach
– An intention to treat definition of DAP participation and a quasi-experimental and pseudo-prospective research design compared recidivism outcomes of the treatment group to a propensity score matched control group. Cox and Poisson regression techniques determined survival time to first reconviction and rates of reconvictions adjusted for time at risk.


Findings
– DAP enrolment was associated with significant improvements in odds of time to first general reconviction (15 per cent) and first violent reconviction (by 27 per cent) compared to controls. Reconviction rates were significantly lower (by 15 per cent) for DAP enrolees. Programme completion was necessary for significant therapeutic effect; 62 per cent completed the programme.


Practical implications
– This evaluation suggests the 20 session DAP is an effective intervention which could be adopted by other jurisdictions to modify criminal behaviours of domestically abusive men; potentially lessening the physical, emotional and financial impacts on victims and providing savings to government and criminal justice systems. The methodology, with refinements, could be adopted by other service providers to evaluate similar community-based therapeutic interventions in forensic settings.


Originality/value
– First peer reviewed evaluation of the DAP. The programme contributes to evidence-based best practice interventions for domestically violent men.

Some research has considered whether faith-informed programs help persons with a previous incarceration navigate a life away from crime. Few studies considered whether offense category moderates this relationship. Building upon studies that found a strong association between a prior sexual conviction and participation in religion in prison, we assess whether time spent in humanist, spiritual, and religious (HSR) programs in prison is associated with reconviction, separately for persons convicted of a sex offense and any other offense. Our results revealed that a higher level of participation in HSR programs was associated with a lower likelihood and rate of reconviction; however, this effect was more pronounced for persons with a prior sexual conviction. Supplementary analyses revealed that the use of religion in an extrinsic manner was beneficial, suggesting this group may look to religion to gain social support and overcome rejection and loneliness. Extrinsic religiosity among other groups, however, was associated with an increased risk of reconviction.

Abstract: Reasoning and Rehabilitation is a cognitive‐behavioual training programme for offenders, accredited by the Home Office for use with offenders in prison and on custodial sentences in England and Wales. Evidence the programme achieves significant reductions in offending is questionable. A matched control study is reported which used both offending and psychometric outcome measures. Findings for reconviction are mixed. Offenders whose attitudes changed pro‐socially were more likely to be reconvicted than were offenders whose attitudes did not change positively. This casts doubt on whether reconviction is reduced because of attitudinal change, and on the use of measures of attitudinal change in evaluation.

AbstractThe efforts of a specialist employment agency for ex‐prisoners resulted in 65 men starting work soon after their release from prison. The present study considers evidence regarding their involvement in further criminal activity in the subsequent ten years. The claims in terms of modifying subsequent reconviction rates must be modest but, remarkably, of the men who worked in the job for at least a year, not one was reconvicted. The authors argue that the task is to find work which is commensurate with the offender's skills and further suggest that finding suitable employment may be particularly beneficial for offenders with a "medium risk" of reconviction.

Working with groups of offenders against children, combining prevention, social skills and education, has proved helpful to participants and so far there have been no reconvictions.

Figures published by the Ministry of Justice show significant progress against New Labour's targets to reduce reoffending by young people within the youth justice system. The outgoing government was, unsurprisingly, quick to infer that such findings constituted corroboration of the improved effectiveness of youth justice practice under their administration. This article considers whether such an inference is warranted and discusses other potential explanations of the data.

Many countries are now exploring new models of justice in the hope that they can be more effective than the traditional criminal justice system in responding to victims, reducing the probability of reoffending and contributing to community safety. This article describes two pilot schemes which used community panel meetings to decide on diversionary plans for adult offenders. Both displayed elements of restorative justice processes, particularly adopting plans designed to make amends for offending. One placed an emphasis on the participation of victims and taking part in rehabilitative programmes. The other placed emphasis on responsibility to the indigenous community and taking reintegrative measures. Despite these differences, both schemes resulted in fewer reconvictions and less serious reconvictions compared to matched control groups and both schemes represented financial savings compared to conventional court processes and correctional outcomes.

California's state superintendent for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation's Office of Correctional Education explains how the department provides programming and teaches skills to both prisoners and parolees to reduce their reconviction or return-to-prison rate, three years after release from a CDCR institution.

Nina Biehal, Sarah Ellison and Ian Sinclair present the results of an independent evaluation of the Multidimensional Treatment Foster Care (MTFC) programme for young offenders in England, where it is known as Intensive Fostering (IF). A quasi-experimental, mixed-methods study was carried out at the three pilot sites, with a total sample of 47 at follow-up. Young people sentenced to IF were compared to a similar group, matched on the eligibility criteria for IF, the majority of whom were sentenced to custody. The groups were well matched in terms of their characteristics and criminal histories. Official data on reconviction were collected at baseline and one year after entry to the IF placement or release from custody (Stage 1), and further data on programme completion and secondary outcomes were collected via interviews with young people and parents, and questionnaires to professionals at baseline and follow-up. Official data on reconviction were also collected one year after exit from the IF placements (Stage 2). At Stage 1 the IF group were less likely to be reconvicted, had committed fewer and less-serious recorded offences, on average, and took longer to commit their first recorded offence. At this point the IF group were more likely to be living with their families and less likely to be in custody than the comparison group. However, by Stage 2 no significant differences in patterns of reconviction remained. IF successfully contained a high-risk group in the community, but the effects of the intervention diminished once they left their foster placements. Environmental effects on entry to and exit from the IF placements may help to explain the results at both stages.

Paul Crosland, a researcher at Lancaster University's Department of Applied Social Science, assesses how the local probation team might develop a basis for comparing the work undertaken by each officer and suggests that 'effective practice' might be supported by identifying the officers whose caseload history demonstrates 'preferable' court outcomes and lower rates of reconviction than might normally be expected.

The central issues that should be answered by the criminal statistic system pertain to the extent, structure and development of crime rates, the decisions of authorities for prosecution and sanctioning, the amount and type of imposed criminal sanctions, the enforcement of sanctions and the amount of reconviction after sanctioning. In this respect the German criminal statistic system has many deficits. Therefore it is necessary to supplement the existing statistics through periodical crime and victimisation surveys, to supplement the prison statistics and to implement statistics regarding suspected persons in the preliminary proceedings of public prosecutors, the enforcement of criminal sanctions as well as periodic reconviction statistic. But a comprehensive optimisation of the criminal statistics system requires the establishment of a statistical data base in which all data of the police crime statistics and all criminological relevant judicial decisions are recorded with pseudonymised individual data and subsequently linked with each other. This statistical data base will solve the problems of the current German crime statistics and will offer a basis for the implementation of new regular federal statistics, in particular with regard to the execution of a sentence and recidivism as well as the implementation of case-flow statistics and cohort studies.

Abstract
Leveraging the richness of population register data in Denmark, this study provides an in-depth examination of the residential situations of the formerly incarcerated over the first 3 years after prison. These data allow us to examine precisely who former prisoners reside with after release, and whether the characteristics of housemates, such as prior conviction status, and relationship type, such as familial ties, are associated with criminal reconviction. While Denmark has one of the lowest incarceration rates in the world, like many other Western countries, it is challenged by high recidivism rates among the formerly incarcerated. Using data on the population of all individuals released from prison between 1991 and 2014 and estimation via Cox proportional hazards models, we find that formerly incarcerated individuals who move into a residence with other individuals with criminal records have significantly greater hazards of reconviction, even after controlling for an extensive set of observed confounders. Residing with family members, particularly spouses, significantly reduces the likelihood of recidivism, but only if the family members do not have a recent criminal conviction. Results underscore the importance of housing arrangements and family ties during the post-release period.